This paper is part of research on Urban Lake Governance in India which includes in-depth case study of Mansagar Lake Governance. The focus of the paper is on people's perception on social and ecological aspects of Mansagar.

One of the most urgent challenges facing the world today is ensuring local water security under rapid climate variability and change. This is of particular importance in a country like India, where over half of the people are involved in farming, and agricultural losses due to climate change are estimated to be as high as 30 per cent by 2080. This ethnography in the arid village of Bhiwadi, West Rajasthan empirically links the reintroduction of local water harvesting technologies with the building of sustainable social reproduction in subsistent communities.

Water is recognized as an important resource without which life in earth cannot exist. According to ancient Indian texts, water is one among the basic five elements called ‘Pancabhutas’ with which the universe, the cosmic world comprises of; earth, light/heat, air and ether/space being the other four elements. Ancient people depended more on agriculture

Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT) is situated in the Southeast of Bangladesh covering about 10 per cent of the total land. It is the native hoe of 13 tribal communities and these communities have their own traditional knowledge for natural resource managements. This paper provides 8 traditional knowledge namely, folk classification of landform, land use zoning, community reserve for common resource management, fuel wood selection for domestic use, water harvesting ditches, tree management in the jhum field by the Murang community, coppice management of Gmelina arborea Roxb.

Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT) is situated in the Southeast of Bangladesh covering about 10 per cent of the total land. It is the native hoe of 13 tribal communities and these communities have their own traditional knowledge for natural resource managements. This paper provides 8 traditional knowledge namely, folk classification of landform, land use zoning, community reserve for common resource management, fuel wood selection for domestic use, water harvesting ditches, tree management in the jhum field by the Murang community, coppice management of Gmelina arborea Roxb.

In 2003, when Hungund taluk in the Bagalkot district of Karnataka was hit by a severe drought, farmers did not have to buy food grain from the market. Nearly 90 per cent of them had built bunds and conserved topsoil using traditional techniques of drought-proofing which have their roots in this district.